Research Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics (MANA), National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-0044, Japan.
Research Center for Macromolecules and Biomaterials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-0044, Japan.
Adv Mater. 2023 Jul;35(30):e2300486. doi: 10.1002/adma.202300486. Epub 2023 Jun 20.
Cell-picking technology is essential for cell culturing. Although the recently developed tools enable single-cell-level picking, they rely on special skills or additional devices. In this work, a dry powder that encapsulates single to several cells with a >95% aqueous culture medium, thereby acting as a powerful cell-picking tool, is reported. The proposed "drycells" are formed by spraying a cell suspension onto a powder bed of hydrophobic fumed silica nanoparticles. The particles adsorb to the droplet surface and form a superhydrophobic shell, which prevents the drycells from coalescence. The number of encapsulated cells per drycell can be controlled by adjusting the drycell size and cell-suspension concentration. Moreover, it is possible to encapsulate a pair of normal or cancerous cells and create several cell colonies within a single drycell. A sieving process can be used to sort the drycells according to size. The size of the droplet can range from one to hundreds of micrometers. The drycells are sufficiently stiff to be collected using tweezers; however, centrifugation separates them into nanoparticles and cell-suspension layers, with the separated particles being recyclable. Various handling techniques, such as splitting coalescence and inner liquid replacement, can be used. It is believed that the application of the proposed drycells will greatly improve the accessibility and productivity of single-cell analysis.
细胞挑取技术对于细胞培养至关重要。尽管最近开发的工具能够实现单细胞级别的挑取，但它们依赖于特殊技能或额外的设备。在这项工作中，报道了一种干粉，它可以用 >95%的水基培养基包裹单个到多个细胞，从而成为一种强大的细胞挑取工具。所提出的“干细胞”是通过将细胞悬浮液喷射到疏水气相二氧化硅纳米颗粒的粉末床上形成的。颗粒吸附在液滴表面并形成超疏水外壳，从而防止干细胞聚结。通过调整干细胞的大小和细胞悬浮液浓度，可以控制每个干细胞中包裹的细胞数量。此外，可以封装一对正常或癌细胞，并在单个干细胞内创建多个细胞集落。可以使用筛分过程根据大小对干细胞进行分类。液滴的大小可以从 1 微米到几百微米不等。干细胞足够坚硬，可以用镊子收集；然而，离心将它们分离成纳米颗粒和细胞悬浮液层，分离出的颗粒可回收利用。可以使用各种处理技术，例如分裂聚结和内部液体替换。相信所提出的干细胞的应用将极大地提高单细胞分析的可及性和效率。
